Saturday, September 14, 2013

Obsessed over the quilted-sweatshirt trend?

Not to worry, you can do-it-yourself :)

of all the quilted sweatshirts I saw while internet browsing, the one that I absolute fell for was the 3.1 Phillip Lim...
Only I have plenty (and more) of grey shirts, and I'm still on a royal blue craze.

My photography skills aren't that good and apparently royal blue isn't camera friendly, so the details in the pictures aren't really showing up :(

Make your baroque / damask design

You might remember from my Facebook page, awhile back I started to draw a damask pattern. Well, I thought I'd use it to stencil or something, and I might do that too, but for now... this is what I used as a template for my quilted sweatshirt.

Quilted sweatshirt with damask pattern: the tutorial // how-to:

make sure that the sweatshirt, the batting, and the t-shirt fabric you'll use are being washed and dried on a regular cycle that you'd be using to was your sweatshirt once finished.

Then, press everything to ensure there are no wrinkles left.

* place your sweatshirt inside out and lay it flat
* place the cotton batting on the front of the sweatshirt and lay flat
* then place the cotton jersey on top (yes, and lay it flat)
pin with abundance and bast in place!!

Turn your sweatshirt inside in and press the freezer paper
with the damask pattern right in the middle of the front.
(fold the freezer paper in half, and mark the half line in the center of a sweatshirt,
to make sure that is perfectly symmetrical)
Although freezer paper is sticking to the sweatshirt, there will be some heavy moving around the sewing machine, therefore I basted the outline of the paper in place)

Open the sides of the sweatshirt (makes it a bit easier, since it's a men's XL and bulky)

Turn the sweatshirt inside out and cut the excess of the batting and jersey fabric around your design.

I whipped a light mattress stitch on the edges of the batting and the t-shirt fabric,
to give it a more polished - finished look.

Now it's time to re-size the sweatshirt

Oversize doesn't mean that I should look like a clown with sleeves that are 8" longer than my arms!!

I used another one of my sweatshirt-DIY, because I really like the fit,
only left it about a 1/2" wider on the sleeves, and slightly longer; since this has an oversize look.
Bast in place and try on - if the fit is right, sew and cut off the extra.

On the left side, mark the sweatshirt at 3" - this is where the zipper will go

Sew back the ribbed edge, leaving the opening on the 3" mark

Tun your ribbed edges (both the bottom and the wrists)
and top-stitch over the seam with the 4mm twin-needles

Place the zipper in placewhile closed,with the cursor at the bottom of the sweatshirt

Turn the edges of the zipper under, bast in place

I sewed a straight stitch next to the metal,
and a small zig-zag stitch at the edge

Thursday, September 5, 2013

I picked the Magazine Clutch

the kit contains: a satin black clutch (I was really pleased with the good quality of this clutch),A bottle of Mod Podge, a tube of Super Glue, a foam brush, and clear instructions on how to make your statement clutch.

I received the kit for free and and this is my take on the magazine clutch: in view of Fashion Week starting today, I believe this could be the IT CLUTCH to carry the Fashion Week essentials: smartphone (and the charger!!), lipstick, and a little compact.

I followed the clear tutorial provided in the box, to glue the cover onto my clutch.When it was time to seal the cover, I added a strip of masking tape on the metal parts of the clutch(I'm a bit on the messy side).I gave the FIRST COAT of Mod Podge using long horizontal strokesand left it to dry overnight - then gave the SECOND COAT using vertical strokes

The two coats with contrasting strokes gave the final clutch a great texture that feels almost like Saffiano leather

And there she is!
A much personalized clutch that nobody else will have.
...And fashion is all about standing out, right?

my first attempt at embroidery on paper

I love the "A woman dressed in red" by Birgit Schoessow on The New Yorker's cover and decided to give it a try.

how I did it: embroidered magazine cover tutorial

I took a picture of the magazine and had it printed on a 8x11 photo paper, because the cover is so thin I was afraid to tear it while stitching on it.I used embroidery floss in these colors: DMC #334 - #817 - #814 - #3831- #310

I placed a little padding surface and started to punched the holes for the stitches about 1/8" apart

This is how it looks on the back

I punched the holes in sections, because I imagine that it would have been really confusing to have all the punching done at once:so started with the title and the skyline and part of the hat,and once that part was stitched, I went down on the dress, punching what I would have stitched color by color.

It took me about three nights, so yes, it was time consuming.At the beginning I was thinking to do just the title, and the skyline, but once I started stitching, I kept adding more and more details and couldn't stop.Embroidery on paper is highly addictive!!

Again, to keep it simple for my first trial, I used a running stitch, and stitched over twice so it would look like a continuous line.

And here my favorite part: the details!

On the wrist, where the bracelet is, I added beads rather than plain stitches

Love the hat that plays with the "O" of the title

This is part of a fashion project that will be shared in the next few days ;) check back later in the week, ok?